A communication device, which may be used for wired and/or wireless communications, may be a base station or other electronic device. Such a communication device may have a transceiver that receives and transmits signals over different frequency bands. The transceiver may be implemented as a receiver and a transmitter. A typical receiver may be designed to process signals in accordance with any suitable protocol and standard, such as time division multiple access (TDMA), frequency division multiple access (FDMA) or code division multiple access (CDMA), among others.
There is increasing demand for more flexible spectrum band access and greater system capacity to support multiple access over a greater number of receiving paths. This poses a higher pressure on hardware resources, requiring better power efficiency and processing speed within a communication device. There are also cost considerations. For example, providing a receiver with a high number of receiving (Rx) paths (e.g., up to 64-256 Rx paths) using conventional receiver architecture may be costly.
Accordingly, it would be useful to provide a solution for processing RF signals over different frequency bands, with lower system hardware costs.